Few people could speak and even fewer could read in the Hebrew language during the Second Temple period; Koine Greek[3][12][13][14] and Aramaic were thelingua francas at that time among the Jewish community. The Septuagint, therefore, satisfied a need in the Jewish community.[8][15]
The term "Septuagint" is derived from the Latin phraseVetus Testamentum ex versione Septuaginta Interpretum "The Old Testament from the version of the Seventy Translators").[16] This phrase in turn was derived from the Koinē Greek:Ἡ μετάφρασις τῶν Ἑβδομήκοντα,romanized: hē metáphrasis tôn hebdomḗkonta,lit. 'The Translation of the Seventy'.[17] It was not until the time ofAugustine of Hippo (354–430 AD) that the Greek translation of the Jewish scriptures was called by the Latin termSeptuaginta.[18] The Roman numeral LXX (seventy) is commonly used as an abbreviation,[2] in addition to orG.[19]
King Ptolemy once gathered 72 Elders. He placed them in 72 chambers, each of them in a separate one, without revealing to them why they were summoned. He entered each one's room and said: "Write for me the Torah ofMoshe, your teacher". God put it in the heart of each one to translate identically as all the others did.[6]
Philo of Alexandria writes that the number of scholars was chosen by selecting six scholars from each of thetwelve tribes of Israel. Caution is needed here regarding the accuracy of this statement byPhilo of Alexandria, as it implies that the twelve tribes were still in existence duringKing Ptolemy's reign, and that theTen Lost Tribes of the twelve tribes had not been forcibly resettled byAssyria almost 500 years previously.[24][better source needed] Although not all the people of the ten tribes were scattered, many peoples of the ten tribes sought refuge in Jerusalem and survived, preserving a remnant of each tribe and their lineages. Jerusalem swelled to five times its prior population due to the influx of refugees. According to laterrabbinic tradition (which considered the Greek translation as a distortion of sacred text and unsuitable for use in the synagogue), the Septuagint was given to Ptolemy two days before the annualTenth of Tevet fast.[15][25]
According toAristobulus of Alexandria's fragment 3, portions of the Law were translated from Hebrew into Greek long before the well-known Septuagint version. He stated thatPlato andPythagoras knew the Jewish Law and borrowed from it.[26]
In the preface to his 1844translation of the Septuagint,Lancelot Charles Lee Brenton acknowledges that theJews of Alexandria were likely to have been the writers of the Septuagint, but dismisses Aristeas' account as apious fiction. Instead, he asserts that the real origin of the name "Septuagint" pertains to the fact that the earliest version was forwarded by the authors to the JewishSanhedrin at Alexandria for editing and approval.[27]
The Jews of Alexandria celebrated the translation with an annual festival on the island of Pharos, where theLighthouse of Alexandria stood—the location where the translation was said to have taken place. During the festival, a large gathering of Jews, along with some non-Jewish visitors, would assemble on the beach for a grand picnic.[28]
The 3rd century BC is supported for the translation of thePentateuch by a number of factors, including its Greek being representative of early Koine Greek, citations beginning as early as the 2nd century BC, and earlymanuscripts datable to the 2nd century BC.[29] After the Torah, other books were translated over the next two to three centuries. It is unclear which was translated when, or where; some may have been translated twice (into different versions), and then revised.[30] The quality and style of the translators varied considerably from book to book, from aliteral translation toparaphrasing to an interpretative style.
The translation process of the Septuagint and from the Septuagint into other versions can be divided into several stages: the Greek text was produced within the social environment ofHellenistic Judaism, and completed by 132 BC. With the spread ofEarly Christianity, this Septuagint in turn was rendered into Latin in a variety of versions and the latter, collectively known as theVetus Latina, were also referred to as the Septuagint[31][32][33] initially inAlexandria but elsewhere as well.[17] The Septuagint also formed the basis for theSlavonic,Syriac, OldArmenian, OldGeorgian, andCoptic versions of the ChristianOld Testament.[34]
The Septuagint may also clarify pronunciation of pre-Masoretic Hebrew; manyproper nouns are spelled with Greekvowels in the translation, but contemporary Hebrew texts lackedvowel pointing. However, it is unlikely that allBiblical Hebrew sounds had precise Greek equivalents.[36]
The Septuagint does not consist of a single, unified corpus. Rather, it is a collection of ancient translations of theTanakh, along with other Jewish texts that are now commonly referred to asapocrypha. Importantly, thecanon of the Hebrew Bible was evolving over the century or so in which the Septuagint was being written. Also, the texts were translated by many different people, in different locations, at different times, for different purposes, and often from different original Hebrew manuscripts.[8]
TheHebrew Bible, also called theTanakh, has three parts: theTorah ("Law"), theNevi'im ("Prophets"), and theKetuvim ("Writings"). The Septuagint has four: law, history, poetry, and prophets. The books of theApocrypha were inserted at appropriate locations.[3][4] Extant copies of the Septuagint, which date from the 4th century AD, contain books and additions[37] not present in the Hebrew Bible as established in theJewish canon[38] and are not uniform in their contents. According to some scholars, there is no evidence that the Septuagint included these additional books.[39][9] These copies of the Septuagint include books known asanagignoskomena in Greek and in English asdeuterocanon (derived from the Greek words for "second canon"), books not included in the modern Jewish canon.[40][10] These books are estimated to have been written between 200 BC and 50 AD. Among them are the first two books ofMaccabees; Tobit; Judith; the Wisdom of Solomon; Sirach; Baruch (including the Letter of Jeremiah), and additions to Esther and Daniel. The Septuagint version of some books, such as Daniel andEsther, are longer than those in theMasoretic Text, which were affirmed as canonical inRabbinic Judaism.[41] The SeptuagintBook of Jeremiah is shorter than the Masoretic Text.[42] ThePsalms of Solomon,1 Esdras,3 Maccabees,4 Maccabees, theLetter of Jeremiah, theBook of Odes, thePrayer of Manasseh andPsalm 151 are included in some copies of the Septuagint.[43]
The Septuagint has been rejected as scriptural by mainstream Rabbinic Judaism for a couple of reasons. First, the Septuagint differs from theHebrew source texts in many cases (particularly in theBook of Job).[15] For example, according toHeinrich Guggenheimer, intentional mistranslations in Deuteronomy 6 make reference to ancient sources of thePassover Haggadah.[44] Second, the translations appear at times to demonstrate an ignorance of Hebrew idiomatic usage.[15] A particularly noteworthy example of this phenomenon is found inIsaiah 7:14, in which the Hebrew wordעַלְמָה ('almāh, which translates into English as "young woman") is translated into the Koine Greek asπαρθένος (parthenos, which translates into English as "virgin").[45]
The Septuagint became synonymous with the Greek Old Testament, a Christian canon incorporating the books of the Hebrew canon with additional texts. Although theCatholic Church and theEastern Orthodox Church include most of the books in the Septuagint in their canons,Protestant churches usually do not. After theReformation, manyProtestant Bibles began to follow the Jewishcanon and exclude the additional texts (which came to be called the Apocrypha) as noncanonical.[46][47] The Apocrypha are included under a separate heading in theKing James Version of the Bible.[48]
Deuterocanonical and apocryphal books in the Septuagint
All the books in Western Old Testamentbiblical canons are found in the Septuagint, although the order does not always coincide with the Western book order. The Septuagint order is evident in the earliest Christian Bibles, which were written during the 4th century.[20]
Some books which are set apart in the Masoretic Text are grouped together. TheBooks of Samuel and theBooks of Kings are one four-part book entitledΒασιλειῶν (Basileon, 'Of Reigns') in the Septuagint. TheBooks of Chronicles, known collectively as Παραλειπομένων (Paraleipoménon, 'Of Things Left Out') supplement Reigns. The Septuagint organizes theminor prophets in its twelve-part Book of Twelve, as does the Masoretic Text.[20]
Fragments of deuterocanonical books in Hebrew are among theDead Sea Scrolls found atQumran.Sirach, whose text in Hebrew was already known from theCairo Geniza, has been found in two scrolls (2QSir or 2Q18, 11QPs_a or 11Q5) in Hebrew. Another Hebrew scroll of Sirach has been found inMasada (MasSir).[52]: 597 Five fragments from the Book of Tobit have been found in Qumran: four written inAramaic and one written in Hebrew (papyri 4Q, nos. 196-200).[52]: 636 Psalm 151 appears with a number of canonical and non-canonical psalms in the Dead Sea scroll 11QPs(a) (also known as 11Q5), a 1st-century AD scroll discovered in 1956.[53] The scroll contains two short Hebrew psalms, which scholars agree were the basis for Psalm 151.[52]: 585–586 The canonical acceptance of these books varies by Christian tradition.
It is unclear to what extentAlexandrian Jews accepted the authority of the Septuagint. Manuscripts of the Septuagint have been found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and were thought to have been in use among variousJewish sects at the time.[54]
Several factors led most Jews to abandon the Septuagint around the 2nd century AD. The earliestgentile Christians used the Septuagint out of necessity, since it was the only Greek version of the Bible and most (if not all) of these early non-Jewish Christians could not read Hebrew. The association of the Septuagint with a rival religion may have made it suspect in the eyes of the newer generation of Jews and Jewish scholars.[34] Jews instead used Hebrew or AramaicTargum manuscripts later compiled by theMasoretes and authoritative Aramaic translations, such as those ofOnkelos andRabbi Yonathan ben Uziel.[55]
Perhaps most significant for the Septuagint, as distinct from other Greek versions, was that the Septuagint began to lose Jewish sanction after differences between it and contemporary Hebrew scriptures were discovered. EvenGreek-speaking Jews tended to prefer other Jewish versions in Greek (such as the translation byAquila), which seemed to be more concordant with contemporary Hebrew texts.[34]
TheEarly Christian church used the Greek texts,[15] since Greek was alingua franca of the eastern parts of the Roman Empire at the time and the language of the Greco-Roman Church, whileAramaic was the language ofSyriac Christianity. The relationship between the apostolic use of the Septuagint and the Hebrew texts is complicated. Although the Septuagint seems to have been a major source for theApostles, it is not the only one. St. Jerome offered, for example,Matthew 2:15 and2:23, John 19:37,[56] John 7:38,[57] and 1 Corinthians 2:9[58][59] as examples found in Hebrew texts but not in the Septuagint. Matthew 2:23 is not present in current Masoretic tradition either; according toJerome, however, it was inIsaiah 11:1. The New Testament writers freely used the Greek translation when citing the Jewish scriptures (or quoting Jesus doing so), implying that Jesus, his apostles, and their followers considered it reliable.[60][35][15]
In the early Christian Church, the presumption that the Septuagint was translated by Jews before the time of Christ and that it lends itself more to aChristological interpretation than 2nd-century Hebrew texts in certain places was taken as evidence that "Jews" had changed the Hebrew text in a way that made it less Christological.Irenaeus writes aboutIsaiah 7:14 that the Septuagint clearly identifies a "virgin" (Greekπαρθένος;bethulah in Hebrew) who would conceive.[61] The wordalmah in the Hebrew text was, according to Irenaeus, interpreted by Theodotion andAquila (Jewishconverts), as a "young woman" who would conceive. Again according to Irenaeus, theEbionites used this to claim that Joseph was the biological father of Jesus. To him that washeresy facilitated by late anti-Christian alterations of the scripture in Hebrew, as evident by the older, pre-Christian Septuagint.[62]
Jerome broke with church tradition, translating most of theOld Testament of hisVulgate from Hebrew rather than Greek. His choice was sharply criticized byAugustine, his contemporary.[63] Although Jerome argued for the superiority of the Hebrew texts in correcting the Septuagint on philological and theological grounds, because he was accused of heresy he also acknowledged the Septuagint texts.[64] Acceptance of Jerome's version increased, and it displaced the Septuagint'sOld Latin translations.[34]
TheEastern Orthodox Church prefers to use the Septuagint as the basis for translating the Old Testament into other languages, and uses the untranslated Septuagint where Greek is the liturgical language.
Critical translations of the Old Testament which use theMasoretic Text as their basis consult the Septuagint and other versions to reconstruct the meaning of the Hebrew text when it is unclear, corrupted, or ambiguous.[34] According to theNew Jerusalem Bible foreword, "Only when this (the Masoretic Text) presents insuperable difficulties have emendations or other versions, such as the [...] LXX, been used."[65] The translator's preface to theNew International Version reads, "The translators also consulted the more important early versions (including) the Septuagint [...] Readings from these versions were occasionally followed where theMT seemed doubtful"[66]
Modern scholarship holds that the Septuagint was written from the 3rd through the 1st centuries BC, but nearly all attempts at dating specific books (except for the Pentateuch, early- to mid-3rd century BC) are tentative.[20] Later Jewish revisions andrecensions of the Greek against the Hebrew are well-attested. The best-known areAquila (128 AD),Symmachus, and Theodotion. These three, to varying degrees, are more-literal renderings of their contemporary Hebrew scriptures compared to the Old Greek (the original Septuagint). Modern scholars consider one (or more) of the three to be new Greek versions of the Hebrew Bible.
Although much ofOrigen'sHexapla (a six-version critical edition of the Hebrew Bible) is lost, several compilations of fragments are available. Origen kept a column for the Old Greek (the Septuagint), which included readings from all the Greek versions in acritical apparatus with diacritical marks indicating to which version each line (Gr. στίχος) belonged. Perhaps theHexapla was never copied in its entirety, but Origen's combined text was copied frequently (eventually without the editing marks) and the older uncombined text of the Septuagint was neglected. The combined text was the first major Christian recension of the Septuagint, often called theHexaplar recension. Two other major recensions were identified in the century following Origen byJerome, who attributed these toLucian (the Lucianic, or Antiochene, recension) andHesychius (the Hesychian, or Alexandrian, recension).[20]
The oldest manuscripts of the Septuagint include 2nd-century BC fragments of Leviticus and Deuteronomy (Rahlfs nos. 801, 819, and 957) and 1st-century BC fragments of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, and theTwelve Minor Prophets (Alfred Rahlfs nos. 802, 803, 805, 848, 942, and 943). Relatively-complete manuscripts of the Septuagint postdate the Hexaplar recension, and include the 4th-century ADCodex Vaticanus and the 5th-centuryCodex Alexandrinus. These are the oldest-surviving nearly-complete manuscripts of the Old Testament in any language; the oldest extant complete Hebrew texts date to about 600 years later, from the first half of the 10th century.[34] The 4th-centuryCodex Sinaiticus also partially survives, with many Old Testament texts.[34]: 73 : 198 The Jewish (and, later, Christian) revisions and recensions are largely responsible for the divergence of the codices.[20] TheCodex Marchalianus is another notable manuscript.
Differences from the Vulgate and the Masoretic Text
The text of the Septuagint is generally close to that of the Masoretes and Vulgate. Genesis 4:1–6[67] is identical in the Septuagint, Vulgate and the Masoretic Text, and Genesis 4:8[68] to the end of the chapter is the same. There is only one noticeable difference in that chapter, at 4:7:[citation needed]
Have you not sinned if you have brought it righteously, but not righteously divided it? Be calm, to you shall be his submission, and you shall rule over him.
Is it not so that if you improve, it will be forgiven you? If you do not improve, however, at the entrance, sin is lying, and to you is its longing, but you can rule over it.
nonne si bene egeris, recipies : sin autem male, statim in foribus peccatum aderit? sed sub te erit appetitus ejus, et tu dominaberis illius.
If thou do well, shalt thou not receive? but if ill, shall not sin forthwith be present at the door? but the lust thereof shall be under thee, and thou shalt have dominion over it.
The differences between the Septuagint and the MT fall into four categories:[69]
Different Hebrew sources for the MT and the Septuagint. Evidence of this can be found throughout the Old Testament. A subtle example may be found in Isaiah 36:11;[70] the meaning remains the same, but the choice of words evidences a different text. The MT reads"...al tedaber yehudit be-'ozne ha`am al ha-homa" [speak not the Judean language in the ears of (or—which can be heard by) the people on the wall]. The same verse in the Septuagint reads, according to the translation of Brenton: "and speak not to us in the Jewish tongue: and wherefore speakest thou in the ears of the men on the wall." The MT reads "people" where the Septuagint reads "men". This difference is very minor and does not affect the meaning of the verse.[citation needed] Scholars had used discrepancies such as this to claim that the Septuagint was a poor translation of the Hebrew original. This verse is found in Qumran (1QIsaa), however, where the Hebrew word"haanashim" (the men) is found in place of"haam" (the people). This discovery, and others like it, showed that even seemingly-minor differences of translation could be the result of variant Hebrew source texts.
Differences in interpretation stemming from the same Hebrew text. An example is Genesis 4:7,[71] shown above.
Differences as a result of idiomatic translation issues: A Hebrew idiom may not be easily translated into Greek, and some difference is imparted. In Psalm 47:10,[72] the MT reads: "The shields of the earth belong to God"; the Septuagint reads, "To God are the mighty ones of the earth."
Transmission changes in Hebrew or Greek: Revision or recension changes and copying errors
The Biblical manuscripts found inQumran, commonly known as theDead Sea Scrolls (DSS), have prompted comparisons of the texts associated with the Hebrew Bible (including the Septuagint).[73]Emanuel Tov, editor of the translated scrolls,[74] identifies five broad variants of DSS texts:[75][76]
Proto-Masoretic: A stable text and numerous, distinct agreements with the Masoretic Text. About 60 per cent of the Biblical scrolls (including 1QIsa-b) are in this category.
Pre-Septuagint: Manuscripts which have distinctive affinities with the Greek Bible. About five per cent of the Biblical scrolls, they include 4QDeut-q, 4QSam-a, 4QJer-b, and 4QJer-d. In addition to these manuscripts, several others share similarities with the Septuagint but do not fall into this category.
The Qumran "Living Bible": Manuscripts which, according to Tov, were copied in accordance with the "Qumran practice": distinctive, longorthography andmorphology, frequent errors and corrections, and a free approach to the text. They make up about 20 per cent of the Biblical corpus, including theIsaiah Scroll (1QIsa-a).
Pre-Samaritan: DSS manuscripts which reflect the textual form of the Samaritan Pentateuch, although the Samaritan Bible is later and contains information not found in these earlier scrolls, (such as God's holy mountain at Shechem, rather than Jerusalem). These manuscripts, characterized by orthographic corrections and harmonizations with parallel texts elsewhere in the Pentateuch, are about five per cent of the Biblical scrolls and include 4QpaleoExod-m.
Non-aligned: No consistent alignment with any of the other four text types. About 10 per cent of the Biblical scrolls, they include 4QDeut-b, 4QDeut-c, 4QDeut-h, 4QIsa-c, and 4QDan-a.[75][77][m]
The textual sources present a variety of readings; Bastiaan Van Elderen compares three variations of Deuteronomy 32:43, theSong of Moses:[74][failed verification]
Deuteronomy 32.43, Masoretic
Deuteronomy 32.43, Qumran
Deuteronomy 32.43, Septuagint
.
.
1 Shout for joy, O nations, with his people
-------
2 For he will avenge the blood of his servants
3 And will render vengeance to his adversaries
-------
4 And will purge his land, his people.
1 Shout for joy, O heavens, with him
2 And worship him, all you divine ones
-------
-------
3 For he will avenge the blood of his sons
4 And he will render vengeance to his adversaries
5 And he will recompense the ones hating him
6 And he purges the land of his people.
1 Shout for joy, O heavens, with him
2 And let all the sons of God worship him
3 Shout for joy, O nations, with his people
4 And let all the angels of God be strong in him
5 Because he avenges the blood of his sons
6 And he will avenge and recompense justice to his enemies
7 And he will recompense the ones hating
8 And the Lord will cleanse the land of his people.
TheBrian Walton Polyglot [it] byBrian Walton is one of the few versions that includes a Septuagint not based on the Egyptian Alexandria-type text (such as Vaticanus, Alexandrinus and Sinaiticus), but follows the majority which agree (like the Complutensian Polyglot).
TheAldine edition (begun byAldus Manutius) was published in Venice in 1518. The editor says that he collated ancient, unspecified manuscripts, and it has been reprinted several times.
TheRoman or Sixtine Septuagint,[79] which usesCodex Vaticanus as the base text and later manuscripts for thelacunae in theuncial manuscript. It was published in 1587 under the direction ofAntonio Carafa, with the help of Roman scholarsGugliemo Sirleto,Antonio Agelli andPetrus Morinus and by the authority of Sixtus V, to assist revisers preparing the Latin Vulgate edition ordered by the Council of Trent. It is thetextus receptus of the Greek Old Testament and has been published in a number of editions, such as: those ofRobert Holmes andJames Parsons (Oxford, 1798–1827), the seven editions ofConstantin von Tischendorf which appeared at Leipzig between 1850 and 1887 (the last two published after the death of the author and revised by Nestle), and the four editions ofHenry Barclay Swete (Cambridge, 1887–95, 1901, 1909). A detailed description of this edition has been made by H. B. Swete inAn Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek (1900), pp. 174–182.
Grabe's edition was published in Oxford from 1707 to 1720 and reproduced, imperfectly, theCodex Alexandrinus of London. For partial editions, seeFulcran Vigouroux,Dictionnaire de la Bible, 1643 and later.
TheGöttingen Septuagint(Septuaginta: Vetus Testamentum Graecum), a critical version in multiple volumes published from 1931 to the present, is not yet complete; the largest missing parts are the historical books (Joshua, Judges, Samuel, Kings, Chronicles), Proverbs and Song of Songs, as well as a new edition of Psalms. Its two critical apparatuses present variant readings in the Old Greek text and variants of the other Greek recensions (i.e., the Hexapla, Theodotion, Symmachus, Aquilla, Lucian).[81]
In 2006, arevision of Alfred Rahlfs'Septuaginta was published by theGerman Bible Society. This revised edition includes over a thousand changes.[82] The text of this revised edition contains changes in the diacritics, and only two wording changes: in Isaiah 5:17 and 53:2, Is 5:17ἀπειλημμένων becameἀπηλειμμένων, and Is 53:2ἀνηγγείλαμεν became by conjectureἀνέτειλε μένà.[83]
One of the main challenges, faced by translators during their work, emanated from the need to implement appropriate Greek forms for variousonomastic terms, used in the Hebrew Bible. Most onomastic terms (toponyms, anthroponyms) of the Hebrew Bible were rendered by corresponding Greek terms that were similar in form and sounding, with some notable exceptions.[87]
One of those exceptions was related to a specific group of onomastic terms for the region ofAram and ancientArameans. Influenced by Greek onomastic terminology, translators decided to adopt Greek custom of using "Syrian"labels as designations for Arameans, their lands and language, thus abandoningendonymic (native) terms, that were used in the Hebrew Bible. In the Greek translation, the region ofAram was commonly labeled as "Syria", while Arameans were labeled as "Syrians". Such adoption and implementation of terms that were foreign (exonymic) had far-reaching influence on later terminology related to Arameans and their lands, since the same terminology was reflected in later Latin and other translations of the Septuagint, including the English translation.[88][89][90][91]
Reflecting on those problems, American orientalist Robert W. Rogers (d. 1930) noted in 1921: "it is most unfortunate that Syria and Syrians ever came into the English versions. It should always be Aram and the Aramaeans".[92]
The first English translation (which excluded the apocrypha) wasCharles Thomson's in 1808,[93] which was revised and enlarged by C. A. Muses in 1954 and published by the Falcon's Wing Press.[94]
The Septuagint with Apocrypha: Greek and English was translated by Lancelot Brenton in 1854. It is the traditional translation, and most of the time since its publication it has been the only one readily available. It has also been continually in print. The translation, based on theCodex Vaticanus, contains the Greek and English texts in parallel columns.[95] It has an average of four footnoted, transliterated words per page, abbreviatedAlex andGK.[citation needed]
The Complete Apostles' Bible (translated by Paul W. Esposito) was published in 2007. Using the Masoretic Text in the 23rd Psalm (and possibly elsewhere), it omits the apocrypha.[citation needed]
TheOrthodox Study Bible, published in early 2008, features a new translation of the Septuagint based on theAlfred Rahlfs' edition of the Greek text. Two additional major sources have been added: the 1851 Brenton translation and theNew King James Version text in places where the translation matches the Hebrew Masoretic text. This edition includes the NKJV New Testament and extensive commentary from an Eastern Orthodox perspective.[97]
Nicholas King completedThe Old Testament in four volumes andThe Bible.[98]
Brenton's Septuagint, Restored Names Version (SRNV) has been published in two volumes. The Hebrew-names restoration, based on the Westminster Leningrad Codex, focuses on the restoration of the Divine Name and has extensive Hebrew and Greek footnotes.[citation needed]
The Holy Orthodox Bible by Peter A. Papoutsis andThe Old Testament According to the Seventy by Michael Asser are based on the Greek Septuagint text published by the Apostoliki Diakonia of theChurch of Greece.[99][additional citation(s) needed]
In 2012, Lexham Press published theLexham English Septuagint (LES), providing a literal, readable, and transparent English edition of the Septuagint for modern readers.[100] In 2019, Lexham Press published theLexham English Septuagint, Second Edition (LES2), making more of an effort than the first to focus on the text as received rather than as produced. Because this approach shifts the point of reference from a diverse group to a single implied reader, the new LES exhibits more consistency than the first edition.[101] "The Lexham English Septuagint (LES), then, is the only contemporary English translation of the LXX that has been made directly from the Greek."[102]
TheInternational Organization for Septuagint and Cognate Studies (IOSCS), a non-profitlearned society, promotes international research into and study of the Septuagint and related texts.[103] The society declared 8 February 2006 International Septuagint Day, a day to promote the work on campuses and in communities.[104] The IOSCS publishes theJournal of Septuagint and Cognate Studies.[105]
^Originally placed after 3 Maccabees and before Psalms, but placed in the appendix of some Eastern Orthodox Bibles if it is included.
^Originally placed in an appendix after the Old and New Testaments in the Table of Contents of the Codex Alexandrinus, but not included in any modern canon due to its text being lost until the 17th century.
^These percentages are disputed. Other scholars credit the Proto-Masoretic texts with 40 per cent, and posit larger contributions from Qumran-style and non-aligned texts.The Canon Debate, McDonald and Sanders editors (2002), chapter 6: "Questions of Canon through the Dead Sea Scrolls" by James C. VanderKam, p. 94, citing private communication withEmanuel Tov on biblical manuscripts: Qumran scribe type c. 25 per cent, proto-Masoretic Text c. 40 per cent, pre-Samaritan texts c.5 per cent, texts close to the Hebrew model for the Septuagint c. 5 per cent and nonaligned c. 25 per cent.
^abBeckwith, Roger T. (2008).The Old Testament Canon of the New Testament Church: and its Background in Early Judaism. Eugene, Oregon: Wipf and Stock. pp. 382, 383.ISBN978-1-60608-249-2.
^abTov, Emanuel (1988)."The Septuagint". In Mulder, Martin Jan; Sysling, Harry (eds.).Mikra: text, translation, reading, and interpretation of the Hebrew Bible in ancient Judaism and early Christianity. Philadelphia: Fortress. pp. 161–2.ISBN0-8006-0604-3.
^Davila, J (2008)."Aristeas to Philocrates".Summary of lecture by Davila, February 11, 1999. University of St. Andrews, School of Divinity. Archived fromthe original on 18 June 2011. Retrieved19 June 2011.
^Ziva, Shavitsky (2012).The Mystery of the Ten Lost Tribes: A Critical Survey of Historical and Archaeological Records relating to the People of Israel in Exile in Syria, Mesopotamia and Persia up to ca. 300 BCE. Cambridge, England: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.ISBN978-1-4438-3502-2.
^Barclay, John M. G. (1998).Jews in the Mediterranean Diaspora: from Alexander to Trajan (323 BCE–117 CE). Edinburgh: T&T Clark. p. 424.ISBN978-0-567-08651-8.
^J.A.L. Lee, A Lexical Study of the Septuagint Version of the Pentateuch (Septuagint and Cognate Studies, 14. Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1983; Reprint SBL, 2006)
^Gilles Dorival, Marguerite Harl, and Olivier Munnich,La Bible grecque des Septante: Du judaïsme hellénistique au christianisme ancien (Paris: Cerfs, 1988), p.111
^abcdefgErnst Würthwein,The Text of the Old Testament, trans. Errol F. Rhodes, Grand Rapids, Mich.: Wm. Eerdmans, 1995.
^abH. B. Swete,An Introduction to the Old Testament in Greek, revised by R.R. Ottley, 1914; reprint, Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1989.
^Paul Joüon, SJ,A Grammar of Biblical Hebrew, trans. and revised by T. Muraoka, vol. I, Rome: Editrice Pontificio Instituto Biblico, 2000.
^Guggenheimer, Heinrich (1998).The Scholar's Haggadah: Ashkenazic, Sephardic, and Oriental Versions. Northvale, NJ: Jason Aronson.ISBN978-0-7657-6040-1.
^Sanders, JA (1963), "Ps. 151 in 11QPss",Zeitschrift für die Alttestamentliche Wissenschaft,75:73–86,doi:10.1515/zatw.1963.75.1.73,S2CID170573233, and slightly revised inSanders, JA (ed.), "The Psalms Scroll of Qumrân Cave 11 (11QPsa)",DJD,4:54–64.
^Jerome,From Jerome, Letter LXXI (404 AD), NPNF1-01.The Confessions and Letters of St. Augustin, with a Sketch of his Life and Work, Philip Schaff, Ed.
^abTov, E. 2001. Textual Criticism of the Hebrew Bible (2nd ed.) Assen/Maastricht: Van Gocum; Philadelphia: Fortress Press.
^Flint, Peter W. (2002)."The Bible and the Dead Sea Scrolls". In Cook (ed.).The Stellenbosch AIBI-6 Conference. Proceedings of the Association Internationale Bible et Informatique "From Alpha to Byte". Brill.ISBN978-9004493339.
^Laurence Shiffman,Reclaiming the Dead Sea Scrolls, p. 172
^Joseph Ziegler, "Der griechische Dodekepropheton-Text der Complutenser Polyglotte",Biblica 25:297–310, cited in Würthwein1995.
Siegfried Kreuzer, ed.Introduction to the Septuagint (Waco, TX: Baylor University Press; 2019) 671 pages; general information on the history and transmission of the Septuagint; information on each book of the Septuagint.
Eberhard Bons and Jan Joosten, eds.Septuagint Vocabulary: Pre-History, Usage, Reception (Society of Biblical Literature; 2011) 211 pages; studies of the language used
Kreuzer, Siegfried,The Bible in Greek. Translation, Transmission, and Theology of the Septuagint, Septuagint and Cognate Studies 63, Atlanta: SBL Press 2015.
Timothy Michael Law,When God Spoke Greek, Oxford University Press, 2013.
Makrakis, Apostolos,Proofs of the Authenticity of the Septuagint, trans. by D. Cummings, Chicago, Ill.: Hellenic Christian Educational Society, 1947.N.B.: Published and printed with its own pagination, whether as issued separately or as included together with 2 other works of A. Makrakis in a single volume published by the same film in 1950, wherein the translator's name is identified on the common t.p. to that volume.
Van der Meer, Michaël N. (2020)."The Greek and Aramaic Versions of Joshua 3–4". In Shepherd, David; Joosten, Jan; Van der Meer, Michaël N. (eds.).Septuagint, Targum and Beyond: Comparing Aramaic and Greek Versions from Jewish Antiquity. Leiden-Boston: Brill. pp. 58–100.ISBN978-9004416727.
LXX2012: Septuagint in American English 2012 – The Septuagint with Apocrypha, translated from Greek to English by Sir Lancelot C. L. Brenton and published in 1885, with some language updates by Michael Paul Johnson in 2012 (American English)
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